I'm refreshing myself on storytelling mechanisms. One of the themes I'm looking at is the Hero's Journey. As a professional offering services to other businesses, your market is more narrowly defined as a people who are business leaders or members of a department or group with a specific objective to accomplish.
The hero's journey starts with the a conflict or uncertainty (competing stakeholder needs? How to get all the MBOs (objectives) completed with the few resources on hand?) As an organization offering them a solution for their needs (including making other stakeholders happy), you can deliver the story of their journey through your communications - your sharable articles, your guides and studies, or thought leadership tips and how-tos. Here are a few things about crafting the framework of your story:
By following these concepts, you'll give them a context to relate to, so they will want to take the hero's journey with you. This post was inspired by this article on storytelling tips for fundraising.
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I recently was watching, for the first time, Mad Men, which is a show with stories about a 1960's ad agency and the characters who work there. The central character, Don Draper, is fascinating. His money account is in Big Tobacco (and there's is a lot of literal and figurative smoke in these stories!). In the show's pilot episode, the government started releasing reports about cigarette smoking being bad for your health, and Don was pressured to come up with the right slogan in this new market ecology for his client. Despite his best tries at talking to customers, brainstorming with co-workers, hearing the research, and drinking for inspiration, he couldn't find the right words. When the clients decided to walk out on their meeting, Don finally came up with the slogan "It's Toasted;" everyone thought he was brilliant and he saved the day. He later said, "Fear stimulates my imagination."
If some of you operate like Don, and fear stimulates you, I'm presenting you with a list of what could happen when you don't provide your target audience with content that connects. In no particular order, if you don't concentrate your content toward what your target is wanting, these are some possible scenarios.
This isn't an exhaustive list, certainly, but if I missed anything really important, email me. Today's post is a Venn diagram, showing how your professional/business ecology combines to create your story.
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AuthorDori "Story" Gilbert is Chief Storycologist; passionate about professionals, their journey, and their ability to direct a career story they love. Categories
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